Facing Justice

EIGHTEEN

Henry scowled at the cordless handset with infuriation stemming from his stupidity in allowing Tom to sneak the damn thing into the shower with him. He kicked himself inwardly. He was fuming for letting himself be lax, for not doing everything he would have done normally with a prisoner, for being seduced into believing that because Tom was a cop he would play by the rules. Cops, he should have known by now, know how to break the rules. But above all, for not sticking to the motto he had adhered to for the last thirty years: trust no fucker.

‘He managed to delete the number he dialled, too,’ Henry said bitterly. ‘That means it’s not recorded on this handset and it won’t even redial the number… bastard!’

‘I don’t like this,’ Flynn said.

The men were sitting on the double bed. Henry had decided to allow Tom to have the shower anyway, but had insisted on making him strip in front of him, then go into the shower and leave the cubicle door open and the en suite door too, whilst he washed himself off. Tom had complied by removing his clothes slowly, dropping them on to a pile in front of Henry, then doing a twirl and making a disgusting remark about not having anything else on him, or would Henry like to have a feel up his arse? It was pretty standard prisoner fare, so Henry held his tongue and watched Tom get into the shower.

He collected the clothing and deposited it on the landing. He knew he was taking an evidential chance by allowing Tom to shower, but he was prepared to take it. Some evidence might get washed away, but in terms of the evidence Henry was slowly amassing, Tom was in a very bad place as it built up. Once Tom was in a proper cell, the work would begin in earnest. At the moment Henry was just making the best of a bad job.

‘I’m not keen either,’ Henry agreed. ‘He makes a call and deletes the number. What does that say?’

‘Come and help me?’ Flynn suggested.

Henry nodded. ‘It’s not exactly Colditz, is it? Tell you what, go and recover that gun from the car, will you, and lock the car up if you can. Then get back here and have a root around.’

‘For what?’

‘He must have had that pistol stashed somewhere, as well as the extra cartridges for the shotgun. Somewhere not too far away. Kitchen, probably. I’ll look after him until you’re back.’

‘Then what?’

‘Handcuffed downstairs, as I said, then batten down the hatches for the night and hope it stops snowing. We need a bit of help here, I’d say.’

‘There’s a lot of we’s in that. I could just piss off and leave you to it.’

Henry could not be bothered to get into this dispute again. ‘You do what you have to do. If you want to go, go. I can’t stop you. I’ve had enough of being wound up.’

The griping pain came again just as Donaldson was falling properly asleep in Ginny’s comfortable girly bed. It was as bad as ever and he sat bolt upright, cursing for even thinking the worst was over. Now he realized he should have starved himself and foregone the wonderful meal provided by Alison.

He gasped, sat up, and hoped it would pass. It did not, then suddenly there was an urgency to visit the toilet.

‘Damn.’

He crossed over to the en suite toilet and seated himself on the loo as the gripe creased him again. Never had he felt so ill and miserable.

Henry stood at the bedroom window and watched Flynn trudge back through the snow, a plastic bag in his hand which, Henry assumed, contained the pistol Tom had used. Flynn saw him, gave a wave and, raising the bag, made a gun shape out of his fingers and pointed at Henry. Having had to face too many guns that day, Henry almost ducked.

‘Henry,’ a voice came from behind. Alison was at the bedroom door, a mug of steaming coffee in her hand. She held it aloft for him and he went to her, took it with grateful thanks and sipped it. ‘Very nice,’ he complimented.

‘They have nice coffee in their kitchen. In fact, they have very nice everything. The kitchen must have cost an absolute fortune. It’s one of those German ones. Twenty thousand at least.’

‘Lucky them — but no more.’

‘No… how are you?’

Henry cocked his head and said, ‘Let me think about that… Mmm… stressed, tired, hurt and extremely worried that there’s more to come.’ She touched his cheek with her fingertips. ‘Other than that, hunky dory,’ he said brightly.

‘What about that young lady downstairs? I told her to sit in the living room, incidentally.’

‘Almost forgotten her… the one who thinks her boyfriend has been murdered? What the hell goes on in this village? She was in the Owl earlier. Do you know her?’

‘She was, and I don’t. She turned up today. I don’t think she’s local.’

‘I’ll speak to her once I’ve fastened Tom to a lamp post or something. I don’t really think I’ve time to deal with a domestic dispute, which is what it sounds like.’ The shower turned off, Alison backed out of the bedroom. ‘Thanks for the coffee… much needed.’

‘Pleasure.’

Henry stood at the door to the en suite as Tom stepped naked out of the shower and started to towel himself down.

Flynn recovered the pistol from the front passenger footwell of Tom’s Golf. He did a quick search of the rest of the car, found nothing of interest, so locked it up and left it embedded in the lamp post with hazard lights flashing. Another thing that would have to wait until the morning, or when the snow had eased and a recovery vehicle could get through. He handled the pistol carefully, made it safe, and placed it in a plastic bag he’d brought along, one he’d found in the kitchen. Flynn knew guns, having been in the army at sixteen, the Marines at eighteen and the cops at twenty-four. He had spent some time as an authorized firearms officer in the late eighties before gravitating to the drugs branch. He wrapped the bag around the gun and made his way back to the police house.

He spotted Henry observing him from the bedroom window, acknowledged him but grumbled — again — at the thought of the man who he blamed for basically forcing him out of the force. Back then, Flynn had even been to see a solicitor who specialized in employment law, and the guy had been eager to take on the case and sue the constabulary for constructive dismissal. Flynn had backed off at the last moment, a nagging feeling of doubt at the back of his mind. Henry’s earlier revelation about uncovering some real dirt about his past suddenly made Flynn realize in hindsight that it had been a good move not to take the organization to court. At least all those sleazy things had been kept under the carpet and the cloud he’d left under wasn’t actually a hurricane, as it could have been. Although it was bad enough to have been suspected of nicking a million pounds’ worth of drug dealer’s money.

Perhaps Henry wasn’t completely to blame after all.

Not that it made him feel warmer to him. He still disliked him intensely.

Flynn banged the snow off his feet and entered the house. He checked to see if Callard was still attached to the plumbing — yes — and noticed the young lady with the missing boyfriend now sitting primly in the lounge with a coffee in one hand and Roger’s sloppy head on her lap, as she stroked the old dog.

He also noticed Henry and Alison sharing quiet words at the bedroom door.

Muttering something uncomplimentary about them both under his breath, he went into the kitchen, placed the pistol on the worktop next to the sawn-off shotgun and poured himself a coffee from the filter machine. He leaned with his back to the fridge, sipped the brew, eyes roving the room, wondering if Henry was correct.

Tom had been disarmed of the shotgun in the living room. He had then legged it into the kitchen, but Flynn hadn’t been right on his tail. He estimated that Tom may well have had a good thirty seconds or more alone in the kitchen before Flynn entered. So if Tom hadn’t had the pistol to start with — and Flynn was sure he hadn’t — he’d used that half-minute to get his hands on it. Therefore it must have been hidden within fairly easy reach.

Trouble was, a lot of places were in easy reach. Flynn scanned the room and tried to visualize in his mind’s eye what Tom might have been doing in those precious seconds. Flynn decided on a quick, structured, systematic search instead of trying to second-guess what had happened. Coffee still in hand he walked back to the open kitchen door and began a lazy search, one drawer, one cupboard, at a time; under the sink, in the tiny closet, and on top of the cupboards by climbing on to a chair and peering over the rim. He found nothing, frustratingly. He pursed his lips and placed his coffee down. This time he went through everything more thoroughly, taking his time, going down on his knees and actually moving stuff sideways, removing items to see properly. But then he thought, no. If Tom had managed to get a gun in those few seconds, he wouldn’t have had time to move pots and pans out of the way. He would have put his hand straight on it.

Flynn ran it all back in his mind, then started searching again, but now believing there was nothing to find.

Would he be so stupid as to have a weapon in the kitchen? Especially being married to a sharp-witted woman cop like Cathy, who had obviously stumbled on to something.

Flynn tried to put himself in Tom’s position.

‘If I had an illegal firearm, where would I hide it?’ he muttered out loud.

‘In plain sight?’ suggested a voice behind him. Alison was standing at the door. ‘Maybe somewhere a lady wouldn’t usually look?’

‘Such as?’

‘Have you checked the fuse box?’ She pointed to a rectangular box on the wall by the back door with a pull-up lid. Flynn had glanced at it, recognized it for what it was, but thought no more. The box was maybe eighteen inches long, a foot high and protruded about four inches from the wall.

Unimpressed, he lifted the lid, the hinges on the top so it opened upwards, and yes, there was the fuse panel. ‘Too small,’ he said, and added, ‘but your theory isn’t a bad one.’ He shot Alison a look, as something caught his eye at ground level — the bottom panel of a cabinet that abutted the skirting board at right angles. It was slightly misaligned with the next panel along. Flynn tapped one end of the panel with his toe and it moved. He bent low and dug his fingertips into the end of the panel and pulled. It scraped out and revealed a cavity underneath the base of the cabinet and the floor.

‘Henry, you brilliant bastard,’ he said begrudgingly. He dropped even lower, to mouse eyeline, stared into the darkness, gave a short laugh and reached inside.

Henry tossed a pair of tracksuit bottoms and a T-shirt at Tom. He had found them in a wardrobe.

‘Not exactly a zoot suit, eh?’ Tom smirked, turning his back to Henry, bending down and pulling up the pants. He was referring to the forensic paper suits given to prisoners when their own clothing had been taken for scientific analysis.

‘It’ll do. I imagine you were wearing something different when you killed Cathy.’

Tom turned slowly, putting his arms in the T-shirt. ‘Is this an interview? Is that an allegation? I don’t see my brief present, do you, Detective Superintendent? In fact, I don’t see much in the way of any police procedure so far, do you?’ He sounded cocky and self-assured.

‘Things will work out for the best, you mark my words,’ Henry smiled.

Outside, a large lorry went past the house, one of the few vehicles that had driven past. Tom turned and watched it, then looked back at Henry and slitted his eyes. ‘Best hope you don’t nod off tonight, eh?’ he taunted.

Henry held up a cable tie. ‘Time to fasten up.’

Tom approached Henry with arms outstretched, inner wrists touching. ‘Something else not quite right, eh?’

‘The handcuffs?’ Henry looped the plastic around the wrists and crimped them up. ‘Violent and unpredictable prisoners get them.’

Tom simply raised his eyebrows. ‘Not too tight. You wouldn’t want me to lodge a formal complaint about excessive force, would you?’

‘Be my guest,’ Henry said. And with each passing second and each interaction, Henry was more and more convinced that Tom James was a corrupt and dangerous individual. He gave a flick of the thumb and Tom went out of the room ahead of him. A sudden shock of pain in Henry’s shoulder made him scrunch up his face.

Flynn withdrew his hand, his fingers wrapped around the barrel of a Skorpion machine pistol, black, ugly, dangerous looking, a twenty-round curved magazine slotted in it. He placed it carefully on the kitchen floor and slid his hand back inside the secret compartment.

‘If there’s any spiders in here, I’ll scream.’

‘You’ve already found a scorpion,’ Alison said.

‘You know your guns,’ he said.

‘Afghanistan does that to a girl.’

Next he withdrew a semi-automatic pistol, indeterminate make and origin, but probably Chinese, Flynn guessed. He placed this next to the Skorpion and went searching again, pulling out a box containing shotgun cartridges of the exact type used in the sawn-off shotgun taken first from Callard and then from Tom. The next handful was a medium-sized plastic food bag stuffed with 9mm calibre rounds of ammunition. Another foray produced a tight roll of twenty-pound Bank of England notes, causing him to give a whistle of appreciation. The last find was a bag of white powder, about as big as a kid’s pencil case.

‘That’s it,’ he said, pushing himself on to his knees and smiling at Alison’s astonished face. ‘Welcome to the land of the corrupt cop.’

Tom reached the bottom of the steps ahead of Henry. Flynn stood in the hallway by the kitchen door and he and Tom exchanged venomous looks. Henry came down the last step and pushed Tom gently ahead of him towards the office door.

‘Do you want to see what I’ve found?’ Flynn asked Henry.

‘Is it interesting?’

‘Very.’

‘Does he need to see it?’ Henry nodded at Tom.

‘You probably need to see his reaction.’

Tom said, ‘What’s this, another set-up by my wife’s lover?’

‘Let’s look anyway,’ Henry said and gripped Tom’s elbow. He walked him along the hall to the kitchen. Flynn backed into the room, Alison already standing at the back door, then revealed all: the two weapons, the ammunition, the roll of cash, the white powder, all still on the floor next to the panel that plugged the hidey-hole underneath the cupboard.

Henry took in the find, then looked at Tom. ‘Let me remind you, you’re under caution. Anything to say at this moment?’

‘Yeah — this is all bollocks and I’m being set up by this twat here.’

‘And I did it all from Gran Canaria,’ Flynn said.

Henry said to Alison, ‘Can you back this up? Can you be a witness to what Steve found and how he found it?’ She nodded. Henry, who had not released Tom’s elbow, tightened the grip and pulled him back out of the room and steered him towards the office. They walked past the open living-room door in which the young woman with the missing boyfriend still sat, hunched up, looking wretched on the settee, Roger’s head still in her lap.

Tom spotted her. She saw him at exactly the same moment. The expressions on both their faces changed dramatically. But then they passed and Henry edged Tom into the office, sat him down in a chair.

‘Some big questions coming your way, Tom,’ Henry warned him. He made no reply.

‘Sir, excuse me.’

The young woman was now standing at the office door, a fearful look on her face, her eyes darting from Henry to Tom and back again.

‘I’m sorry, love,’ Henry said. ‘I had some things to do. I’ll be with you as soon as I can. Sit down, just give me a few more minutes.’

‘No — you don’t understand. Him!’ Her forefinger pointed accusingly at Tom. ‘It’s him… he’s one of them.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘My boyfriend,’ she blabbed, trying to find her words, but everything in her mind was obviously jumbled.

‘You need to think very carefully about what you’re going to say, darlin’,’ Tom said. There was more than an undercurrent of menace in his voice, accompanied by a pointed, meaningful look.

‘Shut it,’ Henry growled. ‘This man’s your boyfriend?’ Henry asked.

‘No, no… last time I saw my boyfriend,’ she tried to explain, ‘he was with him, he was one of them…’

‘One of who?’

‘One of the ones that came for him, to take him away.’ She got a grip on herself and said clearly, ‘Last time I saw my boyfriend, he was with this man.’ She jabbed her finger at Tom again. ‘And I’ve never seen or heard from him since.’

‘And what’s your boyfriend called?’ Henry asked.

‘Massey,’ she said, her lips quivering, ‘Wayne Massey.’