Hot Seat

Lap Seventeen

The cops put me in the back of their car and drove me to a police station in Liege. I was booked, printed, stripped of my possessions and dumped in an interview room. Thirty minutes later, two plain-clothes detectives blew in. One of them spoke to me in French. I shook my head and told them I didn’t speak French. They frowned as if my inability to speak their language was an affront on my part and continued to bark at me. One of them opened a file and stabbed a finger at a handwritten form. I assumed it was the arrest report. The other detective dangled the bag of white powder now contained in a plastic evidence bag, then tossed it in my face.

Didn’t anyone speak English in Belgium or was this a tactic to break me down? If this was their intention, it was working. My hands were slick with sweat and I didn’t have enough saliva to unglue my tongue from the roof of my mouth. I was scared and isolated, but I’d had enough.

‘Look, find me someone who speaks bloody English or give me my sodding phone back so I can bring in an interpreter.’

One of the detectives put his face in mine and butchered the word ‘asshole’. He said something to his colleague and they gathered up their paperwork and the evidence and left.

The interview room seemed cavernous without the detectives.

‘It’s going to be OK,’ I told myself, but the promise was brittle and it broke on my tongue as I said the words.

The door opened and a tall, angular-looking man walked in. He was in his fifties with thinning brown hair, swept back in a poor attempt to hide the fact. One strong breeze and it would be all over the place. He smiled at me, showing a neat row of teeth that seemed too small for his mouth.

‘Adrian Westlake?’ he asked.

‘Thank God, someone who speaks English.’

‘I might speak English, but I’m not your friend.’

‘I don’t need friends. I just need someone to listen.’

‘That, I can do. I’m John Barrington, by the way.’

Barrington closed the door, took a seat in front of me and placed the file and the evidence bag the two Belgian detectives had been brandishing on the table.

‘Despite the language barrier, I’m assuming you know why you’ve been arrested.’

‘Drugs.’

‘Yes, drugs.’ Barrington held up the evidence bag. ‘Not a huge amount, but enough to exceed what can be considered for personal use. So, this bumps the charge up to intent to distribute and if you brought it from the UK, then we’re adding trafficking to this soup. Do you know the kind of time that carries in this country?’

‘What’s in the bag?’

Barrington laughed and leaned back in his chair. ‘Really? Ignorance is your defence? You know that isn’t going to fly.’

I wasn’t in the mood to dance with this guy. ‘Please just tell me.’

‘Cocaine.’

‘It’s not mine.’

Barrington laughed again.

‘Test my blood. Examine me. You won’t find any drugs in my system.’

Barrington shrugged. ‘That just confirms you’re a dealer or mule and not a user. It’s probably better you cough to a possession charge and hope for a lenient judge.’

‘If it was mine, you’d have a really good point, but it’s not.’

Barrington picked up the evidence bag and peered through it at the coke inside. ‘Hmm, your car, but not your drugs.’

‘Yes.’

Barrington flicked the baggie and wrinkled his nose. ‘Then riddle me this, Aidy. How did the drugs end up in your car?’

‘Someone put them there.’

Barrington dropped the evidence bag in mock shock. ‘Who’d do that? Got any suspects? Who’s been in your car? Tell me and I’ll run them in.’

Haulk had been the only person in my car lately. I didn’t see him as a cokehead.

‘C’mon, Aidy. Name a miscreant.’

‘No one I know.’

‘Aidy, Aidy, Aidy, you can’t give me that. Do you know how much trouble you’re in?’

‘I do, but I can’t change the truth.’

‘OK, let me get this straight. The drugs aren’t yours and no one you know put them there, so what are you saying?’ Barrington slapped his forehead. ‘Don’t tell me, someone planted them in the car. Am I right?’

Barrington was toying with me and it was beginning to irritate me. ‘You said it, not me.’

‘OK, I’ll bite. If someone planted them, then who?’ He spread his arms and waved them as if he was conducting a chorus. ‘All together now.’

‘The cops who brought me in?’

Barrington mimicked a rim shot. ‘I served that one up for you. Seriously, Aidy, bent cops? Is that the best you’ve got?’

‘They were the last ones in the back of my car.’

‘C’mon, son, you’re just wasting my time.’

‘I don’t think so. Why did I get pulled over in the first place? I wasn’t speeding.’

Barrington flicked through the arrest report, as if he didn’t know. ‘Faulty brake light.’

‘John, John, John, you can’t give me that. The faulty brake light line, really? You’re going to go with that?’ I more than enjoyed using Barrington’s mocking words back on him.

Barrington leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms. ‘Why would Belgian cops want to set you up?’

That was a bloody good question and for a second, I didn’t have an answer, but only for a second. The traffic stop, drug bust and Barrington all rang false.

‘I don’t know, but something isn’t right here.’

Barrington’s smile broadened to the point where he exposed all his perfect little teeth. ‘What makes you say that?’

‘There’s nothing wrong with my car. It’s brand new. A faulty brake light is possible, but unlikely, especially when you consider traffic was flowing and I had no reason to use the brakes before the cops pulled me over. And how bloody dumb would I have to be to leave a bag of coke out in the open?’

‘Interesting.’

‘And what’s more interesting is you.’

‘Me?’

I nodded. ‘Who are you? You haven’t produced any identification. You could be some twat off the street for all I know.’

‘Don’t be coarse. It doesn’t suit you.’

‘And how would you know? It’s the first time we’ve met, but you know me well enough to call me Aidy and not Adrian, like it says on my licence.’

‘Lucky guess.’

‘I don’t think so. I also find it weird that you haven’t asked me what I’m doing in Belgium or what I do for a living. But you already know, don’t you?’

‘OK, you got me.’

‘I’m not sure I want you.’

He reached inside the back pocket of his trousers. ‘I’m Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs. I reach the parts that British police officers cannot reach. Some of the rules that tie the hands of your average bobby do not bind me. That makes me your best friend and your worst enemy.’

‘And what do you want with me?’

‘Your cooperation in an ongoing investigation.’ Barrington opened the evidence bag and tipped the bag of cocaine into his hand. ‘Someone is smuggling major quantities of this poison into Britain and I believe a team from the ESCC is responsible.’

‘You’re joking.’

‘And you want to hear the biggest joke of all? I think Ragged Racing is that team. How’s that for funny?’

I wasn’t laughing. Suddenly Jason’s death took on a different meaning. ‘Is Jason Gates’ murder connected to this?’

‘Possibly.’

It seemed more than possible. If Jason had stumbled upon a major drug-smuggling operation, the smugglers would kill to protect it.

‘Are you looking into it?’

‘The police are. If their investigation is connected to mine, it gives me another wedge to split this operation open. So, have I got your attention?’

I had a nasty feeling where this was going. The cat had stopped toying with its prey. It was time to kill the mouse. ‘You had me at a trumped-up possession charge. What do you want?’

‘I need an inside man to tell me if my suspicions are correct.’

‘I haven’t seen anything remotely connected to drug trafficking.’

‘Then I’m wrong, but I still need an inside man to prove that.’

I sighed. ‘What if I say no?’

‘Then I’ll make it my job to see that these drug charges stick and when I take down your team and mark my words, I will, I’ll take you down with them.’ Barrington leered. ‘Treat me badly, and I’ll be your worst enemy.’

I was well and truly buggered. I should be scared, but I just couldn’t summon up the emotion. Since finding Jason Gates’ body, I’d taken too many body blows from too many quarters to feel much of anything.

‘You’re pretty proud of yourself, aren’t you?’ I said.

Barrington grinned. ‘Just a humble civil servant doing his job.’

‘Nice. Why me?’

‘Ragged Racing is a tight unit. Everyone there has been part of the team for years. You’re the new boy. That makes you the only one I can trust.’

‘You could have just asked for my help.’

‘And would you have agreed?’

I was a second too slow to answer.

‘That’s why I needed a little leverage. I know it doesn’t seem fair, but it’s for the greater good and all that tosh.’

Cornered with no escape route, I conceded. ‘What do you want me to do?’

‘I have an undercover officer operating within the ESCC as we speak. Your instructions will come from that person. You won’t see me again if you do your job correctly.’

‘That’s something to be thankful for.’

Barrington belted out a laugh and gathered up everything he’d brought in with him. ‘So can I assume you’re on board?’

‘Do I have a choice?’

‘Not really.’